What would happen after an EMP attack?

One user said that humans had adapted and were far too enlightened today to revert to violence and mayhem in the absence of our modern conveniences.

So let’s walk through the EMP scenario:

Day 1:July Year 200x

5 container ships in the gulf of Mexico fire medium range SCUD missiles high into the atmosphere until it reaches far above Kansas and other states. On board are 45KT nuclear warhead. It explodes creating EMP that takes out all of the integrated circuits in the United States.

That means anything electronic that hasn’t been hardened is going to be ruined. That means your computers, TVs, cars, home electronics, breaker box, phones, radios, cell phones. It also means the power companies, their generators, the backup generators at hospitals, nursing homes, etc.

All of the farms and their harvesting equipment is dead. The trucks that move food to the cities are ruined. The trains that move freight around the country are inoperable.

Every airplane flying crashes. All planes on the down are ruined.

The only thing working are US conventional forces that happened to be hardened against EMP (which means quite a few of them). Some cars stored in underground parking garages would probably work depending on the proximity.

There’s no fall out. Nobody dies from the attack directly.

Day 2:

With power out people’s fridges are DOA. With no working cars, people don’t go to work. In the country and in the suburbs, people take the food out of their refrigerators and freezers before it “goes bad” and have BBQs. It’s a fun time.

People who were driving somewhere are mostly able to make it to town. A few people die of heat stroke on their journeys. In the deep south, particularly Florida, there are a number of deaths due to the heat since air conditioning is out.

In the cities, looting begins quite quickly. The police can’t do much since they’re on foot or on horse.

We know this sort of thing because we have seen what happens during extended power outages. Of course, in those cases cars, cell phones, and other crucial devices still worked but there was still massive looting in the large cities.

Day 3:

Local agencies really don’t know what’s going on since there is no communication. No cell phones. No radio. No land lines. The grid is gone. There are spare parts but no where near enough to fix it all and because of the nature of the electrical grid, all the holes have to be plugged for the juice to flow again. And even if they had enough parts, how do they transport them? No trucks. No cars.

International relief from Japan, China, Canada (though most of Canada is taken out too), Mexico, Europe begins but it’ll be slow going. Food shipments can reach the coast in a couple of days but getting it inland will be a major problem as the vehicles will have to be transported in along with parts to try to get the railroads working again (along with teams to get dead trains off the rails).

In the subs, the party is over. It ain’t funny now. People are finishing off what was in their refrigerator. Most people still have some food in the cupboard.

Stores start rationing their supplies. People are still using money (at least, those who keep cash). A bottle of water is $20. How much cash do you keep in your house?

In the cities, riots have broken out with widespread destruction. Being July, it’s hot and dry. Fires from the riots start to spread.

End of Week 1:

By now, most people in the subs have run out of food they would normally remotely consider eating. Looting at the local Walmart and grocery stores begins as people simply take what they need.

Remember, people aren’t hearing anything from the authorities. There are no working TVs. No working radios. The handful of police are walking in the subs.

If you live in the suburbs, take a close look around. How would the police reasonably patrol your city without cars?

Meanwhile, people in nursing homes have started dying enmasse. Without refrigeration drugs quickly go bad. Anyone requiring help breathing or anything else has already died.

People with type 1 diabetes are starting to see the writing on the wall.

Meanwhile, the first container ships of relief have reached San Francisco, Seattle, LA, San Diego, Houston, Miami, Boston, NY, Washington, Raleigh. Lots of food, medicine, some parts, lots of vehicles.

Unfortunately most of those cities are in utter pandemonium. In the south, tens of thousands have already died from heat. In 2003, when there was a heat wave in France, 14800 people died. They didn’t lose power, they just didn’t have air conditioning. In Florida, the death toll is skyrocketing quickly. Same in most of the other southern states.

End of Week 2:

People are starting to die of dysentery from eating bad food, drinking bad water. Many have left the suburbs to head to rural areas where they think there is food (they’re wrong, harvest won’t happen for months, industrialized food processing involves a lot of transportation between the farms and the slaughter houses).

The typical American family, now out of food and with no access to clean water is starting to get pretty desperate.

What? Only 2 weeks? How much food do you have in your house right now? Go check. I’ll wait….

Okay back? So how much is in your pantry? How long would it last you? If you knew at the start, you might have rationed it better. But you didn’t.

Millions of Americans are wishing they had put those steaks and hamburgers and hotdogs in their basements in the cooler temperatures. Others are wishing they had salted them heavily and cooked them well done to store for the long haul.

In the cities on the coast, power is restored via backup generators relatively close to shore. However, within 10 miles from the harbor, death is everywhere. Don’t agree?

Ever been to San Francisco? LA? New York City? 14 days have passed. Where would you have gone? The smart ones, who are able to, would have found their way to the harbors and waited for air lifts of food and such. But most would probably not think about that.

Meanwhile, armed thugs are starting to systematically go through every building and house looking and taking what they need.

End of Week 3

Starvation is starting to become a real problem. If your local law enforcement had a clue, they had already gotten themselves and helpful citizens around to the stores to gather up supplies to start rationing it.

At this point, martial law has been declared by any competent city government. Some cities decide that, for the public good of course, that all community food will be collected and distributed equally to everyone. In other places, large armed mobs are violently taking what is needed to survive.

Are you a survivalist? Got all your supplies right? Got MREs in the basement. You have an AK47 that you managed to get quietly at a gun show. Your kids know how to use the two shot guns. You’ve been prepared for this day right? Great. You’re about to die.

You see, you might be able to keep a few people away. But word got around that you have supplies because you’re that guy who everyone knew was expecting to “bug out” one day when the government and black helicopters came. You might be able to take out a few people but 200+ Nope. You’re going to take a lot of them out but they’re going to come in, kill you, your family, and your supplies.

What? Don’t agree? People won’t do that? Again: Other than on the coast (in some major cities near harbors anyway) you’ve heard and seen nothing from the government other than the occasional Black Hawk flying around. No TV. No phones. No radios.

A few people have managed to dig up old HAM radios and they are getting distant broadcasts of reassurance but it’s clear that nothing’s coming any time soon if you live significantly inland, especially if you don’t live in a densely populated area.

It’s triage at this point and the rural and suburbs areas are simply too spread out. Unfortunately, in the cities, fires have consumed much of them. Anyone strong enough to get out of there has which further distributes the population.

A few older cars start showing up again on the roads as collectables and just old junkers are fixed up and are able to drive because they didn’t have electronics in them.

End of the first month:

A network of outposts are re-established in most large and medium sized cities. Medium sized cities are faring a bit better. Kalamazoo Michigan, Santa Cruz California, and other cities of this kind are doing okay now as convoys are starting to show up.

Really large cities away from the coast are dead at this point. Sorry Omaha, there’s nobody home anymore.

The Second Month:

Now is when the death toll really starts to go up. First, you have about 5% of the population that was on medication to control their mental states. This is now gone. They will mostly die off this month or take out a few others in the process.

Nearly everyone with Type 1 diabetes has died.

Virtually who requires assisted care at this point has died.

Millions of children under 2 have died. Why? Do you have any children? If you’re not nursing them, how are you feeding them at this point?

There are not many domesticated dogs left that haven’t been freed by owners.

The number of deer left that are near people has diminished to the point of being difficult to find. Same with geese, ground hogs, rabbits, etc.

Most cities of any decent size now have an outpost re-established with convoys of food now arriving. However, it’s starting to become a real problem because, well it turns out that the US and Canada supply a significant chunk of the world’s food. 47% of the world’s Soy beans are produced in the United States. 86% of the world’s corn. The bulk of the world’s wheat.

It’s during this second month that the food shipments to the United States are going to start to dry up as hunger starts to become a significant problem in China, Japan, and other countries that have to import food. The US and Canada make up 20% of the world’s food exports and if you count only basic foods the percentage nearly doubles.

The world has its first universal consensus: Oh shit.

It’s at about this time that those who were celebrating in the streets about the downfall of the great satan are starting to get the first thought that yes, they’re going to die too. North Korea, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq, Egypt, Syria, Pakistan, and many other countries are about to see starvation on a level that has never been seen before.

By contrast, Europe is doing okay. Not great. But okay. Their economies are in ruins but they’re not going to die enmasse.

In Japan, where starvation is a serious concern, they and Korea have enough money to pay top dollar for the dwindling import food supply. Russia, unfortunately, is about to have a very rough year.

Needless to say, the food aid shipments to the United States are starting to dwindle. Western Europe, particularly Great Britain, Spain, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Netherlands are still sending food shipments.

If you’re on the East coast in a secure area, you’re in good shape. If you’re on the west coast, most of you are going to die.

Third Month:

The population of the United States is starting to take on the same appearance it did in 1909.

Urban populations of the United States have had staggering death tolls, particularly those not near the coasts.

Anyone requiring medication that needed to be refrigerated in order to live (anti-rejection drugs, insulin, various heart medications, for instance) has died. Easily 10% of the population on top of the above.

Around 20% of the population has starved.

Another 10% in the south who are living in places that were uninhabitable without modern technology have died. Think LA is nice? Imagine it without water. Any water.

In fact, if you live in California, take a look around. Where does your water come from? Most of the population of Arizona, Nevada, New Mexico and parts of Utah have died.

Power is starting to get restored due to generators and the government now had a decent supply of cars. Fixing the grid has become a priority.

While heat has killed millions in the south, we’re now getting near November. It’s starting to get cold.

The fourth month

I tell people who come and interview that Michigan’s southern part is about the same latitude as Northern California. Winters in the upper part of the United States and lower Canada aren’t that bad – if you have heat.

But we don’t have heat. Natural gas has to be pumped and pumped through a huge network across the country. When power goes out, even for a few days, a lot of infrastructure falls apart. New York’s subways, for example are gone. Much of Chicago has flooded too. Those who have enough propane will be okay, for awhile (at least until armed thugs come and take it).

By this point, restoring natural gas is not going to be a simple matter of restoring power. Ever wondered how natural gas gets to your house? It’s all repairable but it will take time and unfortunately, a lot of that expertise in people has died or is otherwise unavailable. That means bringing people in which will take more time.

If you live in northern states at this point, and you haven’t starved to death, you’re probably going to start dying of exposure.

But that’s a gift compared to what people still struggling to make it in warmer areas as we get reintroduced to cholera, TB, and diarrhea become major problems.

In fact, in 1900 the #1 cause of death in the United States was pneumonia. The #3 was diarrhea. That’s right. The runs killed more Americans than Heart disease, cancer, strokes, etc. And this November, it returns from retirement as people, without proper sanitation, start to die off from all kinds of things that were previously unheard of.

In fact, as November closes, the United States has reverted to a third world country. No, that’s not fair. Third world countries usually have electricity and their inhabitants usually know how to start a fire. Do you know how to start a fire without matches and such? Remember watching Survivor and laughing at them? They were in pretty good conditions to get a fire going. You, by contrast, are wet, cold, weakened, and not sure if it’s even a good idea to start a fire because, well, what are you going to do with it? There’s little food.

On the west coast, food shipments have dropped to a trickle. LA, Seattle, San Fran, it’s not a fun time there now.

One Year later

The grid is re-established in the midwest, the east coast, and much of the south. It’s partially re-established on the west coast thanks to help from South Korea, China, and Japan. Thanks guys. We appreciate it even if most of us are dead.

So what’s the death toll? Conservatively, you’re looking at 40% of the population of the US and Canada has died. That’s probably a best case scenario if food and equipment shipments from the rest of the world come in quickly.

A smart (well not really smart because the states that sponsor terrorists have died off due to the unintended consequences) terrorist would have also zinged Japan, South Korea, the Chinese east coast, and western Europe. If that happened, you would be looking far higher deaths everywhere as there would be no relief coming in.

The population of the United States today is over 300 million people. In 1900 it was 76 million. The biggest reason for the increase isn’t due to birth rate but rather the massive decline of the death rate. And remember, they had infrastructure back in 1900. We’d be worse off than they were because they knew how to live back then.

How many people know how to can food? How many modern Americans know how much wood to cut to burn? How many Americans live in places where they need an elevator, as a practical matter, to get to where they live?

Heck, how many Americans are simply living today because they have access to all kinds of medical technology? How many Americans are living in places that can only be inhabited thanks to modern technology? Most of the south west was a barren desert until electrical pumps became possible. Much of the south wasn’t, as a practical matter, livable until air condition.

Also, consider our immune systems of today versus what it was 100 years ago. Our sterilized world has made us very vulnerable to the bacteria and viruses that lurk just outside our electrified civilization. And they would be back to visit within weeks.

Conclusions

Is what I describe realistic? Nobody really knows. There are studies out there. The book One Second After is a bit more dire than I think it would be. And it may turn out that our infrastructure is tougher than it seems or that the types of nuclear warheads that an Iran or North Korea could produce aren’t powerful enough to cause the necessary EMP.

But what is so frightening is how vulnerable we are. It wouldn’t take much of a shove to bring down the electrical grid. You could still end up with a situation where 10% of the American population (30 million) die simply by screwing up the electrical grid for a couple months.

Do I think this will happen? Probably not. I have a lot of faith in humanity. But when one considers the things that we worry about – global warming comes to mind, it amazes me how unconcerned people are at how easily disrupted our modern lives could be given how dependent we are on our technology today.

two things. One it is unlikely that nukes could produce this effect as well as you discribed, however they do create large emps so it is still possible. Two, all the electronics that were shut off at the time would still function. Also I live in Kansas and most farm tractors would still work becuase they have no electronics. The attack would be catastrofic in a city, but in central US it would not be nearly as bad becuase the technoligy is not as dense as in large citys. However kansas City will be screwd, but most of it is in missouri so they can just die

dont mean to quibble but if they use spark plugs or glow plugs (gas or diesel) they will still be affected

do feel that less dense populated areas will be less affected for the simple fact that such ones have a tendency to have stronger bonds and are more apt to do more with less because they dont always have what they need at the corner drug store but it would still cause a major disruption in the logicistic networks that spread across the US. Considering "enlightenment" only comes when all survival needs are met and most of us dont really have strong survival skills especially in city areas were our needs are met by the local stores there would be chaos. Coupled with the lack of firm guidance from police, firemen, leaders (due to lack of tech) this chaos would spiral out of control just like your scenario.

It's strange, I had a similar convorsation about this with a coworker a month ago. Although it was assuming an earth wide power failure with the doom and gloom scenario of 2012.

We came to the conclusion that alot of the modern distractions (i.e. Ipods, t.v. video games) would be erraticated and in the end it a culture would emerge focusing on family and friends (and all the drama would be face to face). We agreed that riding around on horses for trasportation would be thrilling. A larger number of people would become more in touch with their inner selves by being forced to deal with their problems instead of glancing them off to distraction. And although numerous people would unfortunatly die, those remaining would probably lead more gratifying, less depressed lives (well, maybe a generation or two after the great fall). But then, we're optimists. And we agreed that with no internet, people would become focused again and probably get to a point where we can throw it all away once more. There would be a rebirth of the theatre, book, newspaper, everything would have much more permanent importance. Mystery and myth would once again add interest to life (ghosts, people of mythical strength and power, ledgendary feats and cities).

Humanity would survive though, and the "3rd" world countries would one up "1st" world countries survival.

I say aliens launch the nukes, then the nations of the world fund a project called XCOM.... I liked the scenario, it's grim but true, people need to stock up on unperishable foods and water. I also agree that even though we're humans, our baser instincts would take over.

A few would hold to their fundamental Christian beliefs, and they would physically die for their efforts. The rest would be in a state of dog-eat-dog, and most would die of those efforts as well. Live by the sword - die by the sword.

Draginol, I don't have the positive faith in 'humanity' that you do. Quite the opposite. I think that 'human nature' is basically bad. It is 'dog-eat-dog' rather than 'brother help brother' (or 'sister help sister' or any other relation help another relation). If worse comes to worse, we will see more killing than saving - by a ratio of 2/3 to 1/3. And the 1/3 will lose.

(at least, on the physical level - as far as the physical goes)

"Also, consider our immune systems of today versus what it was 100 years ago."

Exactly why I never get a flue shot, or any other med that would compromise my own immune system.

My body can take care of itself, thank you very much. I don't need no stinkin' shot to do what my own body can do for itself!

Only electronics would get fried by an EMP from a nuclear detonation distant enough not to fry them the conventional way. Electrics, on the other hand, wouldn't. An EMP is simply a huge electromagnetic pulse which induces electric current in any conductor within the field. The current can be strong or minor, and is usually minor at those distances which would probably be less or equal to what we get during severe solar storms (for example, half of Canada lost its power during the last strong solar storm) - in fact, there is another coming in a few years if I remember right.

What this means is that, yes, your fine electronics are vulnerable to EMP - microchips don't handle random electric currents running all over too well. But electric installations, especially small ones, are not that vulnerable. This means that huge lengths of conductor cables, like the ones you have in power lines, would induce a proportionately large amount of electric current, which is what causes emergency shutdowns or failures due to overload of the power grid when a solar storm hits.

Your tractor would hardly feel it. Your phone would not melt. Your fuses might, hope you got some spare ones! Unless your car is dependant on a computer to start, it would still run, though the gauges and stuff might act funky (I once drove a car which had a crazed onboard computer). Your flashlight would work, of course. And so on.

As for survival, I agree, there would be a lot of dead if technology failed... urban society is just too dependant on it now. Global society, even. And the fact that the US cultivates a culture where weapons are prominent wouldn't help either.

Personally, in a situation like that, I'd head down to the coast. You can fish, and if you know how to build a shelter and light a fire without matches, you've got a good shot at decent survival. I'd stay away, if possible, from large congregations of people, because that's where the human leeches and predators would flock to as well.

Are you a survivalist? Got all your supplies right? Got MREs in the basement. You have an AK47 that you managed to get quietly at a gun show. Your kids know how to use the two shot guns. You’ve been prepared for this day right? Great. You’re about to die.

You see, you might be able to keep a few people away. But word got around that you have supplies because you’re that guy who everyone knew was expecting to “bug out” one day when the government and black helicopters came. You might be able to take out a few people but 200+ Nope. You’re going to take a lot of them out but they’re going to come in, kill you, your family, and your supplies.

What? Don’t agree? People won’t do that? Again: Other than on the coast (in some major cities near harbors anyway) you’ve heard and seen nothing from the government other than the occasional Black Hawk flying around. No TV. No phones. No radios.

I've got a huge problem with this. You're taking herd mentality into account in one instance, just to disregard it in the next. We're talking humans here. When they try to attack your "bunker", they'll stick together until ten of them have died. Then they'll break and scatter.

They're human cattle. Not Spartans storming you with spears. After that initial effect, though, I'm sure that individualgroups will come up with ridiculously contrieved plans to take whatever goods you have, wheter it's actually worth the effort or not. Your scenario is in the U.S. - the 'survivalist' is obviously not going to be the only one with a gun.

I'd still say that the survivalist has a higher than average chance to make it, simply because the cattle will be at eachother's throats long before they're on the survivalists. It's simply easier to take scraps from the weak than to rob the King of the Hill and risk your life.

One user said that humans had adapted and were far too enlightened today to revert to violence and mayhem in the absence of our modern conveniences.

OMG what bubble do THEY live in? Apparently they've never tried to shop early on Black Friday. That will give you just a taste of the shit storm that would happen if there ever was a breakdown in civilization. Or better yet spend a couple of days in lock up, or go hit the streets of a city wearing the wrong colors. Do they remember Katrina?

This interested me enough to do some more research, and there's something I want to point out. For a nuclear weapon to cause an EMP large enough to affect the entire county, it would need to be detonated about 250+ miles above Kansas, which is higher than the International Space Station orbits, and is also higher than the orbit of many satellites. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electromagnetic_pulse

Most countries that would be likely to launch such an attack (North Korea, Iran, etc) don't have the missile technology to get a nuclear warhead to that height. They could maybe get a small payload that high, but none of their missiles are powerful enough to get a large payload like a nuke that high.

Additionally, most of the US nuclear missile silos are hardened against such attacks, since they were built during the height of the Cold War. The various ICBM submarines that are on constant potrol would also be safe from an EMP. I could be wrong, but I also think that the Presidential bunker, the NORAD command center under Cheyenne Mountain have similar protection. The US' nuclear capabilities would be largely intact. So any country that would enact an EMP attack would still face massive retaliation, so they would have to be extremely stupid, IMO, to launch one of these attacks.

A terrorist group could maybe get their hands on the tech to launch one of these attacks (stolen from Russia, etc) but I think that is highly unlikely. IMO, the most likey way for such a situation to ever exist is a massive solar flare, but even that is unlikely (although possible) to knock out the entire infrustructure of a country irrepairably (unless its a really small country *cough* Luxembourg *cough*).

Up until recently, I was living in Los Angeles for a few years. I used to joke around that it was the biggest planned cannibal community in the US. 10 Million people living in a desert where they have to pump the water over a mountain is not my ideal place to be when "it" hits the fan.

I don't really think we're in immediate danger from a group with the sophistication and resources to put a small nuke into the US upper atmosphere. It isn't the nuke so much as the rocket, but maybe I'm wrong. The logistics of getting both and having the know how to hide, deploy, and launch it are pretty considerable. I still think the main concern is someone detonating a nuke in a port, or from a small airplane flown near a US city.

That said, yes, our society is tremendously vulnerable to this kind of event. If something disrupts the transportation system, it is all down hill. I think a lot of vehicles and electronics that are not in use or are in storage could possibly survive EMP. Also, people are very innovative, and they are going to get older vehicles that don't have computers in them running very quickly. Since there will only be abut 1% of volume of cars on the road, there will be some fuel. Also, things like commercial jets are made to be able to take lightning strikes. EMP can potentially be a lot worse, but my point is, they are not as fragile as you might think....they have some hardening, and if the nuke were small enough and low enough, a lot of planes might be ok. But any piece of electronics with an antenna or attached to a grid will be fried, so yeah, it will be a huge problem. Engineers will be tremendously valuable people....lawyers not so much.

But I want to throw another thought out there.....

Huge Solar Flare / Storm

At any time the sun can potentially have a geomagnetic solar event that would cause huge amounts of induction in the power grid. So much that it would melt the copper in the transformer stations, just like an EMP would. It wouldn't be enough to hurt vehicles and a lot of electronics, but it could disrupt or damage the communications system. That is secondary, however, to the destruction of the power grid, which would take years to repair, because transformers need to be replaced when they are destroyed...which is hard to do when nothing works.

Worse, a solar event can last long enough to do this to a widespread area, possibly the whole world, in one fell swoop. Some areas with modern systems might fare better. Ironically, the US East Coast, with its aging grid, is the most vulnerable. As was pointed out in the above scenario, when the power stops, food and fuel processing stop as well, and people dependent on electricity for life support, environmental control, or medication refrigeration are SOL.

It is a natural disaster, but it would have a similiar effect as described above because the most critical thing to our society is our dependence on electricity.

A terrorist group could maybe get their hands on the tech to launch one of these attacks (stolen from Russia, etc) but I think that is highly unlikely. IMO, the most likey way for such a situation to ever exist is a massive solar flare, but even that is unlikely (although possible) to knock out the entire infrustructure of a country irrepairably (unless its a really small country *cough* Luxembourg *cough*).

LOL !!! You beat me by 4 minutes!!! And yeah, I agree with you, it is hard for someone to pull off the EMP nuclear attack without huge resources to put the right nuke high enough. However there is a school of thought that the atmosphere in the 30-50km range would optimally distribute the ionization causing the EMP pulse. Otherwise, yeah, it should be a lot higher in the atmosphere to hit the whole country, according to what I've read. We don't do upper atmosphere nuclear testing for this reason, so different people have different predicted scenarios for how bad an EMP event could be...not that even a small one wouuldn't be bad.

Up until recently, I was living in Los Angeles for a few years. I used to joke around that it was the biggest planned cannibal community in the US. 10 Million people living in a desert where they have to pump the water over a mountain is not my ideal place to be when "it" hits the fan.

Personally, I wouldn't want to live anywhere in California. Pretty much the whole state is a disaster waiting to happen. It's on a giant fault line, they don't have their own water, it's prone to massive wildfires (which apparently some people don't know, because they continue to move to the places with the highest fire danger), and it's got a bunch of large cities that would make great targets for potential terrorists. Of course, this is completely off-topic.

I agree with you about the solar flare. IMO, its much more likely than an EMP bomb/high altitude nuke, etc,but still pretty unlikely. The real reason it would take so long to make new transformers after a flare isn't because the industry is shut down (although that wouldn't help things either). It's actually because makeing new transformers is time-consuming and there are very few places that make them. If I remember correctly, there's only 5 or so places that make them in the world. I saw something on the Discovery channel about what would happen in the event of a massive solar flare, but it was a while ago, so I could be wrong.

Exactly why I never get a flue shot, or any other med that would compromise my own immune system.

My body can take care of itself, thank you very much. I don't need no stinkin' shot to do what my own body can do for itself!

Flu shots and other vaccines expose you to a small dose of live or killed pathogens or their surface proteins giving your natural immune system a chance to learn how to fight the infection. Your immune system remembers and if you are infected again it fights far more effectively.

If I remember correctly, vaccine actually BOOST the immune system, as its activity is increased when they are preasant.

In any event, terrorist do not strike me as very bright people, and I doubt that they could pull this off. Also, Brad ignored the fact that a lot of aid would be coming by plane, as opposed to by road: the Air Force often uses those big cargo planes to drop food & suppli9es, and I believe that the technology is common to other developed countries around the world. Lastly, I know from experiance that insulin can last for several months without refrigeration: you would run out before it ever "went bad".

It's actually because makeing new transformers is time-consuming and there are very few places that make them. If I remember correctly, there's only 5 or so places that make them in the world. I saw something on the Discovery channel about what would happen in the event of a massive solar flare, but it was a while ago, so I could be wrong.

Yeah, I'm with you there, they are very hard to make, and they can't be fixed if destroyed in the way we are describing -- they have to be replaced. My point was if the infrastructure breaks down, you can't even start making new ones until someone bootstraps industry somewhere. Not arguing with anything you said though, I think we have the same point of view.

5 container ships in the gulf of Mexico fire medium range SCUD missiles high into the atmosphere until it reaches far above Kansas and other states.

That's because SCUD missiles have a maximum altitutde of about 150km so I said 5 container ships shooting them above various states to get the blanket protection.

2) The article explicitly mentions air lifting. However, you could not use airlifts to supply the United States. It took the bulk of the US air force to airlift 1 city during the Berlin airlift.

3) I definitely think there are other things that can have the same effect such as solar flares. People often forget that our electronic society is a very very recent phenomenon. For all we know, serious solar activity could be like a 100 year flood type scenario and we just haven't run into it yet.

Errm, okay? I have type one diabetes but you can live on for ages because with a lack of insulin your blood sugar will stay high and even a sugar cube can 'keep you going' for quite a while. Okay, (fresh) food will be gone but you can live on just carbs from your closed a long time. We'd feel piss poor and be destroying our organs, but that won't be of much concern in above situation.

I think people are seriously overestimating the EMP effect produced by nuclear weapons, as well as vulnerability of our electronics to it. The OP article sounds more like doomsday scenarios often aired on Discovery and such, which take scientific facts and spin them into extreme and spectacular.

It took the bulk of the US air force to airlift 1 city during the Berlin airlift.

In the 1940s. The technology has significantly improved since then. Cargo planes cross the Atlantic all the time. If worst came to worst, they could always rip the seats out of passenger airliners and use them.

One thing I was thinking about: people would notice that this wasn't a regular blackout. Thanks to bad sci-fi video games, the concept of an EMP is relatively well known. People would see that cell phones and other non-gid-powered gadgets weren't working, and a lot of them would say "isn't there supposed to be some kind of bomb that burns out electronic stuff?" Of course, the EMP effect is often portrayed as being temporary and local, so I imagine a lot of people would try to wait it out or get out of the "force field". When that didn't work, they would probably panic.

My knowledge of electrical physics is not perfect: is it the total length of the wire that determines the energy absorbed, or the distance over land the wire travels? If it is the latter, then generators and electric motors would still work, as the wire is coiled and takes up a comparitively tiny amount of space.